From the Left

From the Right

The right is generally critical of the fact that the President’s statement prioritized economic gain over human rights, but nevertheless agrees with the decision to remain allied with Saudi Arabia.

“President Trump is correct in saying the world is a very dangerous place. His surrender to this state-ordered murder will only make it more so. An innocent man, brutally slain, deserves better, as does the cause of truth and justice and human rights."

Washington Post

“Mr. Khashoggi, a resident of Virginia though not an American citizen, was a columnist for an American newspaper, The Washington Post. It did not serve the safety of journalists or Americans abroad that President Trump could not summon even a modicum of lip service to condemn the abomination of dispatching a hit team equipped with a bone saw to throttle and dismember Mr. Khashoggi for daring to criticize the crown prince."

“Thanks to advances in fracking, the U.S. has overtaken Russia and Saudi Arabia as the world’s top petroleum producer... Canada now sells us four times more petroleum than Saudi Arabia does.”

“The defense spending of Egypt, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates is, in aggregate, ‘at least five times greater than Iran’s’... the argument that Iran ‘is on the brink of regional hegemony defies reason.’”

“15 of the 19 September 11th hijackers were Saudi citizens, and the lead attorney for the 9/11 plaintiffs claimed there is evidence demonstrating... ‘longstanding and close relationships between al Qaeda and the religious components of the Saudi government.’”

NBC News

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“As some hawkish Republicans tried to make the case to Trump, the risk here is that the United States looks weak. And Trump is tacitly confirming that it’s not strong enough to punish Saudi Arabia. He’s saying Saudi Arabia is just too powerful and potent for him to want to jeopardize anything. So much for the idea that Trump would exert his will on the world stage and make other countries respect us again.”

Washington Post

Many note that “previous presidents may have paid lip service to human rights concerns, but since the modern U.S.-Saudi relationship began with a meeting between Franklin Roosevelt and Ibn Saud about the Suez Canal in 1945, every U.S. administration has prioritized the energy and security partnership with the kingdom over human rights concerns...

Marco Rubio added, “Our foreign policy must be about promoting our national interests. It is in our natl interest to defend human rights. HR violations lead to mass migration, help extremism flourish & often result in new governments hostile towards the U.S. because we supported their oppressors."

Twitter

Many posit that “we are aware of no President, not even such ruthless pragmatists as Richard Nixon or Lyndon Johnson, who would have written a public statement like this without so much as a grace note about America’s abiding values and principles. Ronald Reagan especially pursued a hard-line, often controversial, foreign policy against Soviet Communism, but he did so with a balance of unblinkered realism and American idealism. Mr. Trump seems incapable of such balance...

“The risk is that Mr. Trump’s public reduction of the relationship to crass interests is that the Crown Prince will feel he can do anything and suffer no diminution of U.S. support. We hope Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and National Security Adviser John Bolton are delivering a much tougher message in private.”

Others, however, argue that “were Trump to directly blame bin Salman, it would cause a major rupture in U.S.-Saudi relations and the likely realignment of Saudi foreign policy away from America and towards Russia... Trump's choice here was between risking American security and directly recognizing the brutal murder of a decent man. And in the cause of realism... Trump has made the right choice."

Washington Examiner

Many also point out that “authoritarian regimes all over the world kill dissidents and/or activists with rival factions. Russia has killed some. That didn’t stop Obama-Clinton from ‘resetting’ relations with Putin... Under these circumstances, it would not be wise to blow up a valuable geopolitical relationship over the murder of one member of an out-of-power Saudi faction. Not in a world as dangerous as ours."

Power Line Blog

“The American Revolution and its ideals cannot be exported and planted everywhere... During the entire Cold War era, we accommodated, supplied, and [helped] train armed government units that worked for anti-Communist authoritarian regimes, especially in Latin America... At times, you deal with very bad people--and this case is no exception. The consequences of blowing up our ties to the Kingdom over this are not worth it."